Working the Limits of “Giving Voice” to Children: A Critical Conceptual Review

Abstract

Although claims to “give voice” to children through qualitative inquiry seem morally just and have been largely framed by good intentions, critical scholarship has called for reflexive reconsiderations of such claims. Re/presentations of voice permeate published accounts of qualitative research with children; similarly, voice is a term invoked frequently in qualitative research with informants of all ages. In this article, we follow Spyrou’s notion of “troubling” to review, critique, and synthesize key works by critical child-focused scholars who have reflexively queried and worked with the epistemological and methodological limits of “giving voice” to children through qualitative inquiry. Building on the reviewed literature, as well as poststructural approaches to framing voice in research more generally, we briefly discuss how we have built on these critiques in our own research. In so doing, we join ongoing dialogues aimed at generating alternative approaches to theorizing and re/presenting children’s perspectives in qualitative inquiry more justly.

Life Quality and Participation of Disabled Children and Young People: Design and Methods of a Transformative Study

“…Throughout the research process, we were aware of the complexities of the much debated notion of “giving voice to children” (Facca et al, 2020; Spencer et al, 2020; Spyrou, 2011; Tisdall, 2012) Within the research processes, we acknowledged disabled children’s and young people’s voices and experiences as complex constructions “where meanings are always situated and open to multiple interpretations” (Facca et al, 2020, p. 9). Also, we acknowledged that our research, like most if not all research, is an interpretive process that necessarily involves carving out and/or foregrounding pieces of data that we ourselves selected, edited and drew on for our theoretical arguments.…”

Attending to Methodological Challenges in Qualitative Research to Foster Participation of Individuals with Chronic Critical Illness and Communication Impairments

“…In reflecting on our study and the strategies we used to include individuals with chronic critical illness as interview participants, we grew increasingly uncomfortable with the language of “giving voice” as a goal of qualitative research. The intention to “give voice” through qualitative research seems to imply mining for voices that simply exist (Facca et al, 2020) and then acting as a megaphone for participants in the ethical service of democratizing knowledge (Brinkmann, 2018). In their research with disabled youth who use augmentative and alternative communication, Teachman et al (2018) critique dominant notions of voice, suggesting that “voice only exists in the relation between two or more speakers in the context of talk,” and is, thus, “not an individual property that researchers can retrieve, enable and possess through interviews” (p. 38).…”

Silent Voices, Absent Bodies, and Quiet Methods: Revisiting the Processes and Outcomes of Personal Knowledge Production Through Body-Mapping Methodologies Among Indigenous Youth

“…Although recent methodological contributions have admirably sought to problematize children’s and youth voice, and the power relations and contexts that mediate them (Carnevale, 2020; e.g. Facca et al, 2020; Spencer et al, 2020), they have done so to the extent that silence or absence remains an extractive and representational site of knowledge production for curious researchers and even those genuinely interested in young people’s voices. Building on these ideas, we demonstrate here that in specific cultural contexts, silence may urge researchers to step back and allow quietness to function in non-representational and ceremonial ways.…”